Search Engine News: Blinkx and Google

By Exclusive Concepts Blog TeamNovember 15, 2005

Search engine Blinkx has beaten Google, Yahoo, and Amazon to the punch when it comes to academic content. They announced today that they will be offering hundreds of hours of audio and video content through their site including academic lectures and speeches. The content will be searchable by keyword and will take users to the exact point in a speech or lecture that they need. Blinkx considers their tool a public service and has no plans to accept fees or sponsorships.
(More on MediaPost and PRNewsWire)

Google will be approaching the Mountain View City Council this week to get approval to provide the whole city with Wi-Fi access. They want to connect the city with free Wi-Fi to increase their user base and to provide more targeted local ads. The heightened targeting will be possible because Google will be able to determine users’ exact locations.
(More in the San Jose Mercury News)

And in case you haven’t heard enough about them, Google is making more news this week by offering another service. And again it’s free. The new web analytics tool will enable users to track all of their online marketing efforts (Google and non-Google) including banner ads, referral links, e-mail newsletters and organic and paid search.

Does all this free stuff from Google seem too good to be true? From DMNews:

some in the search marketing industry view the move as another Google power grab, taking business away from the search marketing agencies and Web analytics companies that traditionally analyze and manage advertisers’ campaigns.

It’s obviously going to be pretty tough for other web analytics firms to stay in business when Google is offering the same service for free. But Eric Peterson from Jupiter Research doesn’t think Google is doing this with any evil intent:

I don’t think Google is explicitly trying to cut out the middleman. I think they’re just being smart and considering the eventual needs of their AdWords customer base: Eventually all of those people will realize the need for Web analytics. Now they can get it with a few clicks of a button. Pretty shrewd of Google, really.(DMNews)